


Mix: God's Gonna Cut You Down

by dear_monday



Category: Bandom
Genre: Fanmix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-10
Updated: 2015-09-10
Packaged: 2018-04-19 15:42:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4751858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dear_monday/pseuds/dear_monday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Now I'm a wanderin' stranger, a scar for a name, a mark so deep and black my children's children feel its shame.</i> This is a weird, scary story that sounds swampy and folky and strange, full of dark secrets and unnerving supernatural presences. A mix about sin and salvation, death and resurrection, the sacred and profane.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mix: God's Gonna Cut You Down

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so, so excited to post this at long last, but before I get into it, I'd like to say a big thank you to [coricomile](http://archiveofourown.org/users/coricomile), who's written some glorious accompanying fic for this mix, and of course to the mods for organising this challenge. You all rock and I am the luckiest girl in the world ♥ ♥ ♥
> 
> Accompanying fic: [whatever bitter brew](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4767992) by [coricomile](http://archiveofourown.org/users/coricomile).
> 
> **Warnings for mentions of violence, disturbing imagery, mentions of alcohol and blood, discussion of religion.**

I really enjoyed working on this mix, mainly because I made it very differently to how I usually work. I'm going to break it down and talk a bit about why I chose each track, how it fits into the overall narrative, that sort of thing, but first I want to say a couple of things about my process.  
Normally, I make mixes like this:

1\. Think about the story I’m trying to tell.  
2\. Go through my library, pull out songs with relevant lyrics.  
3\. Remove anything that doesn't fit in with the overall mood and musical style.  
4\. Arrange what's left in an order that makes narrative sense and doesn’t have any jarring shifts in tone or style.

But this time, I did it the other way around. I started pulling songs together based on how they sounded, then I ditched a few things that didn't seem like part of the story that all the other songs were telling, like [I Had Me A Girl](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1qY8EB4JlQ) and [Help Yourself](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMIt3yvcMUE). I haven't done it this way before because I thought I'd end up with something that sounded great but didn't have any narrative thread or overarching themes, but I was surprised by how cohesive a story this mix told when I eventually put it together. Most importantly, though, I wanted to give my author space to be creative, but not to be so vague that they had nothing to go on, so I hope I've achieved that.

 

 

**01\. House of the Rising Sun | Lauren O'Connell**

_it's one foot on the platform_  
_the other's on the train_  
_I'm going back to new orleans_  
_to wear that ball and chain._

As much as I love the original of this song, Lauren O'Connell's version has this sense of unease that I really wanted to open the mix with. I love that yawing, off-kilter cello, I love the eerie vocal, I love the driving percussion. It also sets up the concept of sin as a character and the themes of restlessness, of travel, of being drawn to certain places for reasons you can't quite explain. All those ideas run through the rest of the mix too, so this song seemed like a good place to start.

 

**02\. Wayfaring Stranger | Preson Phillips**

_I will be free from every trial_  
_my body sleeps in the churchyard_  
_I'll drop the cross of self-denial_  
_and enter on my great reward._

I must have listened to fifty different versions of this song, trying to pick the one that would work best sonically with the rest of the mix. I love how huge the percussion feels when everything drops off at about three minutes in, and the way the guitars play against each other is so nicely done. The lyrics pick back up on the ideas of being on the road and human wickedness, and develop them further.

 

**03\. You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive | Ruby Friedman**

_where the sun comes up about ten in the morning_  
_and the sun goes down about three in the day_  
_and you fill your cup with whatever bitter brew you're drinking_  
_and you spend your life just thinkin' of how to get away._

This track really sets up that stomp-clap thing that I started to think of as the heartbeat of the mix while I was putting it together, and I like the way the lyrics frame the theme of travel as an escape. I also liked the idea of a place being so embedded in your history that no matter what you did, you would always be drawn back there, like the tide, and that concept comes up elsewhere in the mix too.

 

**04\. God's Gonna Cut You Down | Johnny Cash**

_well, you may throw your rock and hide your hand_  
_working in the dark against your fellow man_  
_but as sure as god made black and white_  
_what's done in the dark will be brought to the light._

I couldn't make this mix and not use this song. I just couldn't. It's driven by that same stomp-clap beat, it's about running from things bigger and badder than yourself, it's about the consequences of doing wrong. It's perfect, and that's why it's also the title track.

 

**05\. No Place To Hide | Jace Everett**

_now I'm a wandering stranger, a scar for a name_  
_a mark so deep and black my children's children wear the shame_  
_oh merciful and gracious lord, when shall I be released?_  
_was blood that has condemned me, only blood shall set me free._

This track sits where it does in the mix because it just felt like a really easy, natural progression from God's Gonna Cut You Down. The vocal is so great, and I liked the way the lyrics tie together the themes of travel and some kind of sin or evil that marks a family for generations, which sort of calls back to You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive.

 

**06\. Ain't No Grave | Reckless Mercy**

_there ain't no grave can hold my body down_  
_when I hear that trumpet sound_  
_I'm gonna rise right out of the ground_  
_there ain't no grave can hold my body down._

If the previous songs were about life, this one is about what happens afterwards, which is a thread that's picked up again later by other songs. The lyrics are so simple but there's something about the way the words sound together that just sounds _right_. Say it out loud. You'll see. It isn't flowery or even that poetic, but the mental images it conjures are so powerful.

 

**07\. Sons & Daughters | the American Spirit**

_all you lonely sons and daughters_  
_step into the raging waters_  
_let them swallow you forever_  
_silencing your beating your heart._

Obviously this one was a good fit sonically, but I also liked the lyrics. For me, the reference to water conjures up two things, one of which is obviously baptism (which ties into all the other talk of God and good versus evil), and the other is surrendering to a higher power or a stronger force than yourself. I feel like that calls back to God's Gonna Cut You Down, but carries the idea further.

 

**08\. Awake O Sleeper | Medelheim**

_there will come a day my god will come_  
_and put me in my place_  
_my god, I pray you'll call my name_  
_instead of turn away._

This one is so, so gorgeously ominous. The lyrics call back to what I talked about on No Place To Hide, the idea of something so awful that the fallout affects multiple generations. Towards the end of the song the lyrics also mention a coming war, so there’s also a sense of the shape of things to come.

 

 

**09\. Blood On My Name | the Brothers Bright**

_not a spell gonna be broken with a potion or a priest_  
_when you're cursed you're always hoping_  
_that a prophet would be grieved_  
_oh, lazarus, how did your debts get paid?_  
_oh, lazarus, were you so afraid?_

I like the way this one approaches resurrection, questioning Lazarus rather than just accepting the miracle. It's open to interpretation, of course, but even if it isn't about resurrection in the usual sense of the word, it’s at least about the power of certain acts transcending the grave, their effects lasting long after death.

 

**10\. Chop and Change | the Black Keys**

_found no love in this town_  
_so she'd never mess around_  
_had no luck, but ain't it strange_  
_the girl knew how to chop and change._

This track falls right in the middle of the mix and it kind of sets the tone for the second half. Sonically, it's tinged with the same kind of swampy weirdness that characterises the next two tracks, but it’s still about drifting from place to place and doing what you have to do to get by.

 

**11\. Too Tough To Die | Martina Topley-Bird**

_I always wonder why my mama left town_  
_new haven ain't a bag of salt_  
_when nobody knows your name you look so different over the phone_  
_seven states away they're doin', doin' the strange fruit swing_  
_when they come down, you have to leave town._

This is where things really start getting weird. I feel like this song takes the strangeness of Chop And Change and cranks it up until the room starts swimming and everything gains this weird fever dream quality. The lyrics touch on travel again and the existence of a not-necessarily-merciful higher power in a genuinely frightening way, and that’s what sets the stage for the next few tracks.

 

**12\. Devil Do | Holly Golightly & the Brokeoffs**

_ain't nobody gonna love you like the devil do_  
_well I ain't been saved, honey, what for?_  
_and if I went to heaven I would only get bored_  
_ain't nobody gonna love you like the devil do._

Devil Do flows really nicely from the last song and also picks up on the God/Devil duality again as well as the idea of sin. In this track as well as a few more that fall later in the mix, the devil – unlike god – is framed as understanding, sympathetic, an entity that understands sin and temptation rather than an unforgiving judge.

 

**13\. Like A Mountain | Timber Timbre**

_and out in the woods, lightning struck_  
_I saw death in the eye of a buck_  
_tied to a tree, drowned in the muck_  
_everything had changed._

This track is that feeling when a rollercoaster car stops for a moment at the top of the track before it plummets back down. You know, that moment where you think you're getting a breather but it's just to make sure you really feel your stomach lurch. It's quieter than the tracks that come before and after it, but it still has this driving pulse behind it and the lyrics conjure a kind of obsessive, all-encompassing love that kind of goes unspoken elsewhere in the mix.

 

**14\. Where's the Devil... When You Need Him | th' Legendary Shack Shakers**

_so let it happen_  
_let the pumpkin roots sing praises in pig latin_  
_with the pidgin english spoken, the wormwood will be broken_  
_and the devil will come and crack me out of my casket._

I fucking love this track. It has this manic, unhinged intensity in the chorus that I felt like I had to work up to, which is why it’s near the end. The lyrics play with religion, revenge and resurrection, all of which runs through most of the mix but particularly noticeably into the next song. This song has something truly, deeply disturbing about the sum of its parts, but it still makes you want to dance.

 

**15\. This Devil's Workday | Modest Mouse**

_I could buy myself a reason_  
_I could sell myself a job_  
_I could hang myself on treason_  
_oh, I am my own damn god._

Following on from Where's The Devil, there's something utterly mad about this one, both lyrically and sonically. It feels unstable and dangerous, like what's happened to the speaker (or what they've done) has finally pushed them over the edge and they've stopped caring, they've lost sight of what made them who they were before. To me, it felt like a pivotal moment for the character, whoever they are and whatever has happened to them.

 

**16\. Weapon of God | the Taxpayers**

_crumbled bones inside a sock_  
_the ticking of a busted watch_  
_this storm is a thunderous, dark applause_  
_my love is locked in a pitbull's jaws._

This feels like the moment where everything reaches fever pitch. There's this frantic, barely-contained energy in the music and the lyrics have this confused, stream-of-consciousness quality to them, making for a frighteningly immersive listen. It's a total assault on the senses and it's so vivid. Be warned, this one gets into your head.

 

**17\. Pray On Me | Kill It Kid**

_dirty blade on the forecourt concrete_  
_smell of burnt cotton in the bridal suite_  
_lordy, mama, hurt me so to see you go, I'll never let you..._  
_lord, pray on me, pray on me._

I really liked the distorted vocal sample at the beginning of this track, it flows well from Weapon of God. This is a little bit more controlled than the last track, there isn't that sense of something climbing the walls to be free and to wreak havoc, but it's there under the surface. The lyrics actually start similarly, though, just showing you glimpses of a bigger picture. To me, at least, this song sounds like aftermath. **  
**

 

**18\. Beat The Devil's Tattoo | Black Rebel Motorcycle Club**

_your body's achin', every bone is breaking_  
_nothin' seems to shake it, it just keeps holding on_  
_your soul is able, death is all you cradle_  
_sleeping on the nails, there's nowhere left to fall._

This is another song about running, but there's a growing sense that you can't outrun whatever is chasing you, that you’re nearing a breaking point. Something has to give, and soon. I talked about a fever pitch earlier on, but that kind of state can never hold for long. I think this is also where the thread of exhaustion really starts to come in, and that feeds back into the idea that the end is in sight - whatever that end might be.

 

**19\. Until Morale Improves the Beatings Will Continue | the Builders and the Butchers**

_I walked the road from tucson to san antonio_  
_with the smell of blood on my breath_  
_ninety days of sweat and dirt feels like one night_  
_when you've got nothing left._

This is a song that tells a huge story with very few words. Travelling is a large part of it, but now it feels like the speaker is running because that's all they can remember how to do. It's sort of implied that something happened either to the speaker or happened because of them, and because of it, they're doomed to run until they can't run anymore. There's a sense of rising desperation that picks up again in the last song, so I wanted to use Until Morale Improves to build up to that.

 

**20\. the Devil in Mexico | Murder By Death**

_someone say a hail mary for this house_  
_bless the corners and burn the devil out_  
_someone say a hail mary, someone say a hail mary..._

This was always going to be the final track on this mix, right from the very beginning. It grows from bleakness to this raw, messy desperation that feels like an ending, not a waypoint. The last minute of the song where Adam and Gerard are both singing is like having two voices in your head, screaming bloody murder at each other. This is a mix about duality - good and evil, death and resurrection, the sacred and profane - and the two voices facing off against each other felt like the perfect conclusion.

 

**[listen on 8tracks](http://8tracks.com/dear_monday/god-s-gonna-cut-you-down) | [download](http://www.mediafire.com/download/lllwus8dwc1pf4b/BBB_2015_mix.zip)**


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